Solace Undeserved
by templeg
Summary: In the wake of Sirius' death, Remus finds something- and someone- to grieve the way he wishes he could; someone he knows he doesn't deserve.
1. The Sounds Of Her Grief

Remus looked _old_.

He caught sight of himself in the tarnished antique mirror- one of thousands that seemed to fill Grimmauld Place like a plague- as he left the meeting-room, and stumbled to a halt, allowing the rest of the Order to file past him. He took a step closer towards the man he saw, partially obscured by the black spots that covered the mirror's surface, and noted lines, grey hairs, a thinning of lips. But it was more than that. He thought of how Harry looked at him, there was an innate respect, a determination to at least try to agree with him whatever he said, because- because what? He was older than him? He didn't feel like he deserved it. He didn't _feel _old.

No, that was wrong. He _hadn't_ felt old. With Sirius back, he had been Moony again, only in private, or on the inside, but that boy had been there nonetheless - getting so indignant his sentences devolved into intricate jumbles, with words overlapping and switching places and piling up like a car crash, chewing his bottom lip and furiously twiddling the sleeve of his jumper between finger and thumb, going pink around the ears whenever Sirius _looked_ at him like that from down the table in the middle of a meeting. Now he had vanished without trace, leaving only Remus Lupin, sage and cynical and an old man. He felt withered, his eyes dry. Moony would have cried. He remembered how Moony cried, before transformations or just after them, crying until his horrible nose was irreparably bunged up, until his whole face was red and sticky, and muttering things to himself like '_stupid bloody stupid' _and _'unfair what are you bloody talking about bloody bollocks' _and _'NOT a girl, Sirius'_-

A movement in the corner of the mirror drew his eye- he was not alone in the room. He turned around. Tonks was sat huddled at the table, clutching a cooling mug of tea with both hands. She was staring dully into the fireplace, her eyes unfocused. As he turned, her head came up and their eyes met. She made a small, choked sound in her throat, like a twig snapping, and a tear welled over her lower eyelid and streaked down her face, followed by another, which she brushed hurriedly away with a shaking hand. Within seconds, there were too many to wipe away and she was sobbing, making little hiccupy noises as she tried to control it and pawing uselessly at her face, smearing it with tears. _You are too old to grieve like that_, Remus thought. _But Moony was not the last young person to love Sirius_.

Remus crossed the room and sat awkwardly beside her on the hard, narrow bench. She looked up at him, and he saw that her eyes were redly swollen, the tip of her nose glistening and raw.

'Stupid- sorry-'

He shook his head. She couldn't understand what it was like for him, seeing the sort of grief he wished he could have, the sort of grief Sirius _deserved_. She drew near to him and buried her face in the shoulder of his shabby robes. He put his arms around her and as she shuddered violently in his grasp, dragging in ragged gasps of air, her fingers grasping the back of his robes as if for dear life, he felt something lift, a tension he hadn't even known was there. Closing his eyes, hardly knowing what he was doing, he lowered his head and rested his forehead on her mousy hair.

Tonks made a noise like a gasp and a sob combined and Remus withdrew with a pang of regret. For the second time, their eyes met. Her eyes searched his face, pleading- for what? Her hand, the nails bitten to the quick, traced across his shoulder and up to his jaw, then across his cheek, her fingers searching as though she were blind. Her swollen eyes locked on his, defiant, daring him to tell her to stop.

He unstuck his dry lips, but found he could not speak.

Her thumb had reached his lip. She made another tiny sound, a barely audible intake of breath.

She leaned forward, ever so slightly. Her hazel eyes were wide as her gaze flicked down to his mouth, then back to his eyes.

_That was a question, Remus. Answer it. Tell her you can't- you don't deserve- you can't-_

He could not answer her. He could not move.

They were so close he could feel her breath, hot from her tears. She was less than an inch away. All it would take was the tiniest of movements.

Tonks closed her eyes. She tilted her head upwards a tiny fraction.

Hot and damp met cracked and dry like a breath.

Remus found that his eyes were tightly closed. Tonks' lips moved over his, begging him to reciprocate, searching for solace.

_Why would she come to me? What can I offer her? Being old and broken doesn't make me wise…_

But she cried the tears he could not. And as she tried with mounting desperation to elicit a response, he realised-

_She thinks that she's alone in this. _

Remus wound his fingers into her hair. Tonks' grip tightened on his jaw. His lips were no longer dry, dampened by the tears that ran between them. He had no idea what he was doing but he didn't think he could stop; he badly needed air but couldn't see a way to let go. The voice of reason had been completely drowned out.

Tonks made a sound that might have been a slightly watery giggle, although it was difficult to tell. She broke away momentarily and met his gaze, hazel eyes blazing with hope and joy and love-

_No. _

She ran her calloused thumb tenderly over his cheek. She looked so wildly happy, absurdly so, the eyes that had stared so blankly before were shining and not only with tears.

_She's got it wrong._

Why did she look so trusting? From the way she was gazing at him, he could have been a god, she was blinded by something, she had to be, what had he done to her?

_I will disappoint her. I cannot disappoint her._

Remus pulled away. Something vanished from Tonks' eyes; a shutter fell and obliterated the light.

_A mistake. She'll see it was a mistake, she'll find someone better. It's better to hurt her now…_

Even so, he didn't think he could bear to see her like this. He stumbled wildly backwards, tripping over the bench, averting his eyes from her pleading, disbelieving gaze.

She looked crumpled. Her mousy hair had fallen in her eyes and she made no effort to push it away.

_'_Remus, I love you…'

_Tell her she's wrong, tell her, let her see how much more she deserves-_

'Remus… _please_…'

He fled.

_Author's Note: I really want to write more of this, although I think- hope- it works as a somewhat bleak oneshot. If I do, it is simply going to be the story of how Remus and Tonks' relationship develops, but I'm struggling a bit with what to do next, and whether to just pick out the most important bits and have gaps of weeks or months in between the chapters or tell the whole story. I would love to tell the whole story, even if it ends up being crazy long, I don't mind, but I don't really know how it should develop from here. Obviously I'm still going to think of most of it myself, but if anyone has any suggestions- things they'd like to see, etc.- that would be much appreciated. The title is a working title that may change, I just need something to publish it under. I am aware it's a bit rubbish._

_Illustration(s) (by me) on my profile. Currently only one, for this story- I'm working on more, both for this and for The Last Days._


	2. Favourite Cousins

_He kissed me back._

A tiny something awoke in a corner of Tonks' mind, stretched its limbs, flickered into life. Not hope. Certainty.

Tonks opened her eyes. _Why _was another matter. Pity? She couldn't think that of him, surely Remus of all people would know that to be more cruel than kind. Loneliness? She knew he was lonely, and she thought she had an inkling why. The way Sirius used to stare at him all through meetings…

_I will never compete with that,_ she thought. _Not in a million years_.

Was she the only one who knew? She didn't think so, somehow. There was no way they had fooled Molly, for one. Nothing important ever got past Molly's notice. She'd been plying Tonks with tea lately, even more so than usual, and she sometimes caught her shooting sympathetic glances her way that she didn't think were to do with Sirius. And Snape had had a habit of glancing at Sirius, then Remus, and curling his lip. Not that it was surprising that he should look at them with disdain, but there was something else there, something much more like disgust. Nonetheless, most people probably didn't know, and so couldn't understand the depth of Remus' grief. They had been friends, yes, at school. They were friends when he died, although they had been apart for years. But she couldn't begin to imagine how he really grieved, and most people didn't even know to begin imagining.

_Like me._

Tonks instantly felt horribly selfish. _How can you even compare this to you? People __know__ he was your cousin._

_ But not that we were friends. Not like we were. He was my favourite cousin…_

_Dora is two and in a big house she doesn't know full of people, all talking about two people getting married, which is when a man and a lady love each other and have children, her big cousin Cassiopeia and a tall man with a beard. There's a funny wrinkly little man, almost as small as she is, with great big ears she wants to play with, but when she asked him what his name was he shuffled away and she heard him say something under his breath while looking back at her over one bony shoulder, she doesn't know what but it didn't sound nice and she thinks it was about her. There are lots and lots of pictures, lots more than in her house which hardly has any, and these ones move so at first she was worried that the people in them were stuck but when she touched one of a clever-looking man with a pointy little beard she got chocolate smeared on the frame and he walked away out of the side. She keeps bumping into people, and they look down at her and tut, but there are so many of them and when she tries to get away from them she runs headlong into a huge something with umbrellas stuck into it, a great big foot for a great big animal but she doesn't know where the rest of the animal is and she's starting to want to cry._

_Her first sniffle has just made a lady with very black hair turn round to stare disapprovingly at her when someone bears down on her grinning and waving. Sirius is so big; his chin is all scratchy and as he picks her up, she feels as though she is flying, soaring miles into the air, far from the dusty prickly carpet. She puts out a tiny hand to touch his face and is shocked at how prickly it feels under her sticky little palm. Her wispy hair flashes violently pink_, _a habit she has not yet learned how to control, like sucking her thumb her mummy says, which she doesn't really understand because she only ever sucks her thumb when there's chocolate or something else yummy on it and what could be wrong with that? Across the room, her Great-Aunt Walburga looks up and frowns, then says something quietly to her mother that makes her eyes flash and her lips tighten. Sirius doesn't know exactly what it was but he can guess, and he squeezes Dora a little bit tighter, and she doesn't understand what she did wrong so her hair goes even pinker and she starts to cry, quietly, into the stiff woolen shoulder of his heavy, itchy robes. _

_She is hiccupping noisily by the time he carries her into the hallway, louder and louder hiccups that threaten to turn into fully-fledged sobs. Sirius puts her on the floor and squats down in front of her, looking furious at something- at her?- and also slightly unsure of what to do. He runs his hands through his hair, and Dora thinks that that looks like fun, so she sticks out her grubby hand and does the same. His hair is spiky and surprisingly long. Sirius laughs then, and Dora is momentarily distracted, until she remembers Great-Aunt Walburga and how she upset her mummy and how that was Dora's fault, somehow, and then she starts crying again._

'_Nymphadora, um, don't cry, please, erm, bollocks I- oh bollocks I shouldn't have said that, or that, boll-damn!'_

_Sirius lets out a long stream of words most of which she doesn't understand, but she does hear her name, her real name, the one she doesn't like, so she draws herself up to her full height (which still barely reaches the crouching Sirius' shoulder) and says firmly through her tears:_

'_Don't__ call me Nimdora.'_

_And Sirius laughs, and leans in close to wipe away her tears, and says:_

'_Do you know what? You are definitely my favourite cousin.'_


	3. Don't Say Anything

**Chapter 3- **_**Don't Say Anything**_

Tonks couldn't have told you what Kingsley was saying if you'd paid her.

A small voice in the back of her head was hopping up and down, saying things like _This is probably very important somehow, not that you'd know _and _This is hardly professional Auror-like behaviour _and _What if you need whatever Kingsley is saying about centaurs in some sort of life-threatening, potentially war-winning situation? Then how will you feel?_ Mostly, though, she was absorbed with trying to get Remus to look at her. He was staring down at the table, had been for most of the meeting, and seemed to be picking splinters off the wood. His brow was furrowed in concentration, but he didn't seem to be paying any attention to Kingsley either. She watched his hands, picking at the table with jumpy little movements, and noticed with an odd mixture of satisfaction and regret that like hers, his nails were bitten to the quick.

_Don't say anything. Not yet._

The table at Grimmauld Place had never looked so interesting.

Remus sat with his forehead in his hand, staring at the knots in the dark wood, tracing a long groove with a fingernail. _Look at the line,_ he thought. _Nothing else. __No-one__ else. It goes right past Kingsley's elbow, then sort of loops around Molly's tea, then under Mundungus' bag- which is wriggling, why is it wriggling? - and then splits off two ways, one line towards Arthur and the other one towards-_

_ Damn._

He couldn't stop his eyes from moving upwards. He couldn't avoid her eyes, even though the sight of the dark smudges under them, the pinched red rims, made him feel suddenly winded. Her face lit up and she grinned at him, oblivious to everyone else around them, especially Molly, who looked from Tonks to Remus and then hid behind her mug of tea and turned her attention back to Kingsley's discourse on whether or not it might be possible to get the centaurs on-side.

Remus felt his ears go red. _Does nothing escape that woman? _He attempted to tune himself back into what Kingsley was saying, but he understood only odd phrases, like _'…careful of their pride' _and _'…not do an Umbridge, OK?' _He was just worrying that he might be expected to contribute something somehow, since Kingsley seemed to be pausing for breath, when he felt a tap on his leg and nearly jumped out of his skin. Craning his neck, he saw that Tonks was waving a crumpled piece of parchment at him under the table. The burning heat in his ears spread to the back of his neck. How had everyone not noticed? _Had_ they noticed? Molly seemed to be suppressing a fit of giggles, and he doubted it was because of anything Kingsley was saying.

Tonks pinched his leg with unnecessary viciousness.

'Ow!'

_Well, they've noticed __now__. _

Remus' ears seemed to be throbbing with heat. Kingsley stopped mid-sentence to glare at him from under his eyebrows and Molly gave him a look of supreme smugness from behind her tea mug.

'Sorry… um, splinter.'

Kingsley raised an eyebrow at him and turned away. The piece of parchment had now been balanced on his knee, and Tonks was gazing with unconvincing rapt attention at Kingsley, casting glances back at Remus and waggling her eyebrows.

Remus fumbled to smooth out the parchment.

'_What's an Umbridge? I mean, as in Doing One. Ew.'_

Remus struggled to conceal a snort, turning it with limited success into a strangled cough. He looked up to see that, again, the entire table was staring at him.

'Erm. Dusty in here-'

Molly choked on her tea. Remus glared at her as with agonising slowness people turned back to Kingsley. He flipped over the parchment and wrote:

'_Thanks for that image. No, really._

_And in answer to your question, that mistress of diplomacy called a large, armed group of creatures well-known for their pride and intelligence 'filthy half-breeds'.'_

As he passed the parchment back to her, he felt her bitten nails catch on his palm and could not suppress a shiver. She was staring at him, and at that he saw a flash of suppressed glee light up her eyes, so that for a moment it was as if no-one had died.

'_Oh, I don't know. I would have thought she'd be quite saucy, that kinky little bow etc etc._'

Remus controlled himself, although he felt as though steam might come out of his ears.

'_I- buh- wuh- fuhsuhbluh-'_

'_Wow. That's that answered.'_

'_Come again?'_

'_It is possible to stammer in note form. I wouldn't have thought even you could manage it._

_I know why you're so red, you're thinking about the kinky little bow. Don't try to deny it.'_

'_I'm not red. Am I? Oh God. Molly is staring. I think the game might be up.'_

Tonks looked over at Molly, who glanced hurriedly away.

'_Darn.'_

Remus felt slightly hysterical. He was a _grown-up_, he was _old, _he really shouldn't be passing notes in the middle of an Order meeting and he _definitely_ shouldn't be feeling like this, his ears burning like fiery suns, his mouth dry, constantly twitching in case someone noticed that he was _breaking rules_. He hadn't been like this since Hogwarts. Since Sirius.

'_What are you doing to me? I'm a grown man, I haven't passed notes since I was seventeen.'_

'_Grown man.'_

'…_yes?'_

'_Have you seen your ears recently?'_

'_No, but I can __feel__ them.'_

Tonks was shaking with suppressed laughter, so much so that she nearly knocked over her tea. She glanced conspiratorially up at him from under her hair and then looked away, for a moment looking exactly like Sirius. For a brief, mad second, Remus felt so in love it was all he could do not to leap at her across the table.

She was watching him again. She bit her lip, then bent her head and wrote:

'_I meant it. Just so you know._

_ I still do._

_You don't have to reply to this. Grown man that you are, passing notes in a meeting, etc.'_

Something cold and heavy dropped into the pit of his stomach. Tonks was clutching her tea and staring with determination at Kingsley, her teeth worrying her bottom lip until he thought it would bleed. _This is a bad idea_. _I can't, can't, can't…_

'_Stay behind after the meeting?'_


End file.
